


sets off a loaded gun

by avqct



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Post 2x19, supportive girlfriends
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-10
Updated: 2017-05-13
Packaged: 2018-10-30 11:14:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10875609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/avqct/pseuds/avqct
Summary: Her skin is crawling and she wants to peel it off. She wants to scrub off all of her skin and sit in a tub of —Not water.She’s spiraling.In which J'onn wins an award for best space dad, and Alex Danvers Cannot Deal.Post 2x19.





	1. better hide, better run

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this instead of writing yet another 10 page paper. I have most of a second chapter written, but full disclosure: I'm not 100% sure where this is going to end up. Please check the tags for TW, and comment if there's anything else you think I should tag.
> 
> Starts off during 2x19, after sanvers confesses their love but before Alex is cleared to leave.
> 
> I got a comment that the summary was tactless, and -- accurate. I'm just settling for a quote from the middle of this chapter. Please tell me if my summaries suck, I'm always willing to re-write any part of a story!

Maggie is gone and Kara is gone.

 

Her skin is crawling.

 

Maggie is just out getting food for the both of them. Decent food, instead of the pre-packaged DEO med bay meals. Kara is just helping out with a nearby house fire. She said she’d be as quick as possible. They’d convinced her to stay overnight, but they both said they’d be back and one or both of them would be there with her all night and—

 

Her skin is crawling and she wants to peel it off. She wants to scrub off all of her skin and sit in a tub of —

 

Not water. She wants to scrub off all of her skin with sand, sand that absorbs the water and keeps it off of her but abrades, scratches, _grates_ against her skin until it’s all gone, and she can grow some new skin that she knows hasn’t been touched, and then she can make sure that the only people who touch her new skin are her family and no one else and

 

She’s spiraling. And she knows why, but she doesn’t _know._  Not for sure.. Because when she’d woken up in that cage, her bra had only been half-fastened, and sure, that _could_ happen in a struggle, but—

 

She hadn’t struggled. She’d been drugged, and caught unawares, and hadn’t used _her goddamn training, all that training and she didn’t even get the chance to fight_ —

 

When Maggie told her that he’d been watching them, that he’d watched _them_ , together, and that he’d mentioned oh so casually how he’d liked her in high school, that was when she started to think that maybe it wasn’t a coincidence.

 

There was no point in telling anyone. It wasn’t like they were going to prosecute. There wasn’t any evidence anyway; she’d been treading water for _hours_ , and half of that time was without pants, which likely would have washed away any…

 

thing. Any of the things she’d rather not think about in connection with her body. He’d get his memory wiped, per standard procedure, and that would be the end of it. No one would ever know.

 

Except her. But she couldn’t really _know_ , could she?

 

Alex thought she could live with not knowing, but with the way her head was spiraling down, down, down, she was starting to think that she couldn’t live with a _maybe_. And her lips were sore, and the sides of her mouth felt _stretched,_  and she knew what that meant, she knew, she knew _she knew—_

 

She jumped at the sound of a loud crunch at the doorway of the med bay, looking up from staring at her blanket to see J’onn, a piece of the door frame crunching beneath his hands as his widened eyes stared directly into hers.

 

Alex inhaled sharply, but before she could articulate anything coherent, he had already reached out to the room across the hall and signaled for a doctor.

 

“J’onn, sir, no, it’s…” she couldn’t finish a sentence, and why did everyone have to be a friggin _mind reader—_

 

“Alex,” he said gently, “I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do, but you need to get tested, at the very least. We’ll draw your blood and you’ll never have to hear about it again, if you want. Or we can do a full work-up, they can check your stomach and do a pelvic exam. It’s up to you, Agent Danvers.”

 

Her breathing hitched, and it became harder for her to draw in a full breath. She was panicking, she was panicking because if she didn’t think about it, it would _just go away, it wouldn’t be real if she just ignored it, it—_

 

Mistaking her silence for anger, J’onn immediately tried to apologize. “I didn’t mean to read your mind, Agent Danvers, I apologize, you just don’t normally think so _loudly_ , it was hard to…” he trailed off. “Are you alright, Alex?” He focused outward and noted the change in her heartbeat and the paleness of her face, abruptly rushing to her bedside.

 

She was seconds from passing out. Black spots swam in and out of her vision. Alex felt a hand on her chest and flinched away, but allowed them to grasp her hand and place it against their own chest. She thought she heard someone say, “Breathe with me, Agent Danvers.” She tried to move her chest in time with the movement of theirs, feeling them expand their lungs beneath her hand. It was slow going, but eventually her vision cleared and she felt like she could take a full breath.

 

The agent couldn’t bring herself to look at her boss, and stared at the floor instead. “Sorry, sir,” she murmured, scrubbing at the tear tracks on her cheeks.

 

With impeccable timing, Maggie walked in the door at that very moment, a greasy paper bag in each hand. “I’ve got the food!” she proclaimed, lifting the bags over her head before sensing the tension in the room. “Alex, what…?”

 

The detective noted the tear tracks on Alex’s face, and the regretful look on J’onn’s. “What’s wrong?” she asked, alarmed.

 

Alex suddenly tore her eyes away from Maggie and caught J’onn’s attention, shaking her head once furiously as they exchanged a loaded glance. J’onn nodded, but was still obviously waiting for a reply.

 

“I’ll do the full one. Just… give me a couple minutes, okay?” She couldn’t handle the _not knowing_ any longer.

 

J’onn nodded once more, tentatively giving her shoulder a squeeze before bypassing Maggie and heading to the room across the hall, presumably to talk to one of the doctors.

 

Unsticking her feet from their position, Maggie hastened to her girlfriend’s bedside. “Alex? Babe, what’s wrong?”

 

“Nothing, I just have to get a few more tests done. Just routine stuff, nothing to worry about,” Alex replied in as normal a voice as she could manage.

 

Maggie knew something was wrong. Alex wouldn’t look her in the eye, and if she kept picking at that thread on the blanket, it would unravel. It had been hard enough to let her girlfriend out of her sight for the time it took to walk to the burger place, but she’d needed — _to scream, slide to the ground, sob in relief_ —  some alone time. But in the half hour she’d been gone, Alex had retreated back into her shell, was _hiding_ again when they’d _just_ gotten her back. And Maggie knew that this could happen, after all, she’d been held in a cage and watched as her impending death slowly crept up on her and sliced through her own arm with a credit card and drowned, drowned, _drowned—_

 

But they were in love. They loved each other. And Maggie wasn't going to let the love of her life hide any more than Alex had let her hide. She knew that Alex had trouble expressing when she was hurt, articulating when she needed something, wanted something, other than to protect Kara ( _Maggie could kill Eliza for that_ ). It hurt her heart every time she saw Alex instinctively shove something down without even taking a second to think about it.

 

Maggie swore to herself, not this time. She’d just gotten Alex back alive. They were going to deal with any issues as they came, together.

 

So where usually she might let it go until Alex was ready to share, this time, she pushed.

 

Maggie gently cradled her girlfriend’s cheek in her hand and tilted her head up until their eyes met. “Alex, what is it?”

 

Alex finally held her gaze. The agent’s head felt jumbled, but shining clear through it all was that she loved the woman in front of her, and couldn’t lie to her, not after everything that had happened that day. She also knew that she couldn’t actually say what was wrong. Saying it aloud would make it real. “I’ll tell you after they run the tests, okay? There’s no sense in worrying if everything’s fine,” she told Maggie with a heartwrenching attempt at a smile.

 

Maggie nodded slowly, accepting that this was the best that Alex could do, at the moment. They waited for the doctor to call her over, Maggie standing faithfully at her bedside as Alex clutched her hand.

 

When Dr. Rosenthal knocked a few times on the doorway and signaled Alex with a wave of her hand, Alex started to remove her hand from Maggie’s and made to get up.

 

“Do you mind staying here until I get back?” she asked seriously.

 

This gave Maggie pause. Why would any examination need to be private? She’d already seen everything there was to see… unless Alex was concealing injuries. It wouldn’t be the first time, and they really didn’t know what happened to Alex before they saw the camera feed.

  
Maggie reluctantly let go, nodding, and Alex walked across the hall, her movements slow and stilted from what Maggie hoped was just fatigue, and not a secret busted rib or two.


	2. I know you're feeling buried

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More detail comes from an unexpected source, but it's a mixed bag. Maggie also deserves an award.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a good bit more graphic than the first chapter, so please, if you might be triggered by sexual assault, steer clear of this.
> 
> I actually have the next couple of chapters plotted out, so expect updates.
> 
> Constructive criticism is 100% appreciated. I'm always willing to change things based on feedback.

A few hours later, Alex and Maggie were awoken by a tentative knock on the door frame. They had been taking a quick nap while they waited for the doctors to finish running tests, since Alex wasn’t cleared to leave until then. Fully alert in seconds, Alex looked up to see Dr. Rosenthal entering the doorway, glancing at the chunk missing but taking it in stride. The doctor glanced between Alex and Maggie, a silent question in her eyes.

 

“You can give me the report later. Just… yes or no?” Alex blurted out, unable to handle the tension of not knowing.

 

The doctor looked her directly in the eyes and nodded. “I’m sorry, Agent Danvers. The tests show it’s… what you said you suspected, but not... anything worse. The blood tests, at least, came back negative, but I’m sure you know that you’ll need another round in a few weeks. I’ll email you the full workup.” Noting the building pressure in the room, Dr. Rosenthal took her leave.

 

Alex’s entire body stopped. It was as if she herself had been paused. She remembered the examination. Alex thought that every inch of her had been poked and prodded. She’d even had to throw up into an evidence bag, which… hadn’t actually been that hard. If she thought too much about why she was being examined, she felt nauseous anyway.

 

The feeling of nausea kicked her back into motion as she lunged for the nearby trashcan, gagging. Nothing was left in her stomach, so all she could do was spit into the trashcan, dropping it back onto the floor before curling completely in on herself. Her arms went around her bent legs, her head bowed between them. Maggie could only rub her back soothingly, shocked at the immediate and visceral reaction. “Alex, what…?”

 

Alex turned her head and peeked up at her, an emptiness in her eyes, mouth open, but she couldn’t force the words out. She shook her head and put it back between her knees, curled up even tighter than before. She shied away from Maggie’s hand on her back, causing Maggie to look hurt for a split-second before she paled. Worst-case scenarios were running through her mind. She was a detective, after all. “Alex,” she continued, firm and gentle at the same time. “What happened?”

 

She didn’t want to talk, but she’d made a promise to explain once the test was done. And she’d made Maggie promise that she would talk about her issues instead of lying to make Alex feel better, so she ought to do the same for her. Alex mustered up the last of her courage for the day, and whispered, barely loud enough for Maggie to hear, “When I was drugged, Rick, he — he took advantage of me being unconscious and…” No matter how frustrated she was with herself, she couldn’t make herself finish the sentence.

 

She didn’t need to. Alex could feel Maggie stiffen beside her as she pieced everything together. “He sexually assaulted you?”

 

Alex nodded into her legs. She couldn’t handle today. She’d already been kidnapped and almost died and she was done. _Done_. She rolled onto her side, still in a ball, and pulled the blanket over her head.

 

She wanted to hide. Her skin was crawling and she wanted to peel it off and she never wanted to even _look_ at a pool again and she wanted—

 

 _Maggie_. She wanted Maggie. She abruptly surged into a sitting position and threw herself at Maggie, who instinctively caught her in a hug, cradling her girlfriend to her chest.

 

“Hold on, babe, let me just…” Maggie repositioned Alex and slid down the tiny bed with her, now using the full length of her body to hold on.

 

At the feeling of being in Maggie’s arms, Alex finally let go, her chest convulsing, sobs held in tightly as tears streamed silently down her face. She buried her nose in Maggie’s neck and clung to her, arms squeezing around her girlfriend as if to anchor her to this place, this time, this spot of brightness in a world that just kept getting more bleak.

 

Maggie wanted to cry as well. She was glad that Alex was finally letting go, and cherished the warmth of her girlfriend in her arms, the trust she had placed in her, but Maggie wanted to cry. She wanted to _kill him_. The detective was impossibly torn between a slowly-building rage and a wrenching grief. That man had held her girlfriend, put her in a cage, half-drowned her, and still he felt entitled to her body, to hurt her in yet another way. If Alex hadn’t needed her right then, she might have gotten up and put a bullet in him. She knew he was still in holding. J’onn probably would have let her.

 

Before she could get too deep into fantasizing about any _accidents_ happening in the transporting of a certain prisoner, another doctor entered the room. Alex immediately stilled at the sound, but kept her head buried into Maggie’s side, refusing to emerge from the cocoon she had made. The doctor didn’t seem to mind; she met Maggie’s eyes and motioned to Alex’s back, saying, “She’s free to leave whenever she’s ready. She also has the week off, Director’s orders.”

 

As she watched the doctor turn and leave, Maggie started to rub Alex’s back, noting with regret that her girlfriend had obviously shoved everything back down. “You wanna get out of here?”

 

Alex snorted and sat up, using a spare edge of the blanket to mop her face. “Was that a pick-up line?” she asked disbelievingly.

 

Maggie’s raised an eyebrow. “If you want it to be, Danvers,” she teased.

 

Alex knew that her girlfriend was only joking, but all of a sudden she was _exhausted_. She said as much. “I think this is the most I’ve cried in one day in… probably a decade.”

 

“It’s not every day you get kidnapped, Alex. You have the right to cry,” she insisted firmly.

 

“I mean, it isn’t like I haven’t been kidnapped before,” Alex admitted, frustrated. “I guess there was just… always something more important that I needed to take care of.”

 

Maggie’s heart broke a little bit. She didn’t care what anyone said — her girlfriend was getting the week off, and any world crises would have to wait. Alex was going to know that she mattered just as much as everyone else if it was the last thing Maggie did.

 

“Well. _You_ are the most important thing to me, so we’re going to go to your apartment, and I’m going to take care of you,” Maggie declared.

 

Alex looked up at her and smiled softly. “That sounds like a good plan.”

 

The detective sat up, cracking her back as she stretched, before climbing out of the bed. She ran her hand down Alex’s arm, grabbing her hand and giving it a quick squeeze before releasing her altogether. “I’ll go grab some spare clothes from your locker, and then we can blow this joint,” Maggie joked.

 

Alex hummed an affirmation, waving as her girlfriend left the room.

 

She had been waiting for no more than 30 seconds, deliberately thinking about nothing at all, when Winn came to visit. Alex smiled shallowly, immediately getting up to hug him and land a solid thump on his back. “Thanks for helping to find me, Schott.”

 

“Anytime, Alex,” he affirmed, returning her hug much more gently. “But, actually, could you come look at something really quick?”

 

“Winn, I’m about to go home, can’t this wait until tomorrow?” she pleaded.

 

“First of all, there’s no way you’re coming back tomorrow,” he argued. “But… Alex, this is important. It really can’t wait. Please. I just need five minutes.”

 

She finally looked into his eyes and noticed how serious he looked. In fact, he looked a little green around the gills. “Is everything alright?” she probed, concerned.

 

“No,” he breathed.

 

She stared into his eyes and saw it. He knew. She didn’t know how he had found out, but he _knew_. “It’s about… what he did, isn’t it.”

 

He nodded, wrapping his arms around himself and looking determinedly at the floor. “Alright,” she agreed, trusting him, and followed closely behind as he led her to his work station, fighting the impulse to run away.

 

As he slumped into his desk chair and started pulling up files, he explained. “When we brought an investigative team to the building where you were being held, we realized he had done significantly more video surveillance than we first suspected. He has lots of footage of you and Kara and of Kara as Supergirl. He was even monitoring the building you were in, filming the water tank from other angles.”

 

Alex was immediately filled with a bone-deep dread. She had a hunch as to what the video was going to show. She tried to tell herself that she was just overreacting, but every second of waiting made her feel one step closer to falling to pieces. By the time she tuned back in to Winn’s voice, he had already finished describing the technical side of his job, which she spared a moment to be thankful for.

 

He continued, “I’ve been assigned to go through all of the footage and make sure it hasn’t been copied anywhere, to keep everything classified. That means that I have to at least skim through each of the video files, and when I was looking through the more recent ones, I found…” Here he paused, looking back at her with quiet empathy. “Do you know what’s on the tape? I feel like I should warn you —”

 

“I know. Just play it, Winn,” she interrupted, biting out the words.

 

He quickly acquiesced and pulled up a file dated the previous day. Winn hesitated before gingerly pushing play, swiftly wheeling his chair around so it faced away from the screen.

 

Alex took one look at the monitor, at her unconscious body lying on the floor, Rick Malverne kneeling over her, and closed her eyes. She knew what was going to happen. She heard the rustling of clothes and tried to steady her breathing, not wanting Winn to know how much this was affecting her.

 

The sound of a zipper coming from the speakers jerked her back into reality. Her eyes were immediately glued to the video, watching as her half-naked body groaned and started to twitch. Rick gently shushed her and moved to put himself in her mouth. “That’ll keep you quiet,” he grunted, moaning softly.

 

She closed her eyes again as she heard herself start to choke, and whispered, “Turn it off.” Her hands made an aborted motion to cover her ears as she fought to keep an impassive look on her face. Winn immediately closed the window, clearly uncomfortable.

 

“That’s basically it, until he… finishes. I just… you needed to know that this exists,” Winn informed her in a rasping voice. He was clearly trying to be strong, but struggling. His eyes were shining with unshed tears.

 

“Are you doing alright, Winn? You probably haven’t slept since I was declared missing, judging by how many coffee cups are on your desk.” Deliberately changing the subject, she gestured to the seven disposable coffee cups precariously stacked behind his computer monitors. “Go get some sleep, Schott.” Alex couldn’t bring herself to talk about what she’d just seen, so she fell back on old patterns — make sure everyone else is okay, so she could push all of her issues to the side.

 

“I will, just… what do you want me to do with this?” he asked, haltingly trying to bring the conversation back around. “That’s the only reason I showed you. I can leave this on the DEO servers, or… I haven’t shown anyone else, and you know I won’t tell anyone, so if you want this to disappear forever — I can make that happen.” Winn knew that keeping certain things secret were all that kept you from falling apart. He wouldn’t be able to continue to work at the DEO if there was a sign on his desk that said “Son of the Toyman”, and letting the video continue to exist in the agency cloud would be the functional equivalent.

 

Alex clapped her hands on his shoulders from behind and briefly put her chin on his head in an imitation of a hug. “Delete it,” she agreed, her voice quavering only a little. She released him and walked away, with only a parting, “Sleep, Schott.”


End file.
